"And you shall count for yourselves from the day after the Sabbath, from the day that you brought the omer of the wave offering, seven complete weeks. Even until the time after the seventh Sabbath shall you number 50 days, then you shall offer a new grain offering to YHVH God." Leviticus 23:15-16
While the Bible Itself leaves some detail about how to observe this time between Passover and Pentecost to the imagination, we do know that the Israelites who had just fled Egypt were in need of a complete upgrade in their identity as they moved from slavery to sovereignty. Because the seasons of the year are Divinely Designed to point us toward honoring the Lord's Presence in our lives, we can look at these 50 days as a prompt to peer into the places where we have felt blocked. According to rabbinical tradition, these seven weeks of counting the omer correspond to the refinement of specific godly character traits such as Acts of LovingKindness, Humility, Endurance, Compassion, Majesty, Diligence, and Bonding. We all need these in order to align our hearts and minds to be capable of ministering and stewarding the "greater masterpieces than these" that Messiah Yeshua- Christ Jesus decreed we would oversee in the Earth in John 14.
Those of us who have invited Holy Spirit to live with us inside the command center of our innermost beings can come to know His nature and strategies as we study and fellowship with Him. The Seven-Fold Wholeness of the Fire-Light of Holy Spirit presented by the Menorah in the Throne Room of God outlined in Isaiah 11 and Revelation 3 are the Spirit of the Lord, the Spirit of Wisdom and Understanding, the Spirit of Counsel and Might, and the Spirit of Knowledge and the Reverential Fear and Awe of the Lord. We can ponder how these Spirits operate in a Holy Heavenly Healing Harmony that allows us to Love God and Love our neighbors as ourselves. This means that in solitude, we can quiet our hearts and minds and inquire within to hear from that still, small voice Who Is Holy Spirit Leading, Guiding, and Helping us get to our appointments to meet with our Creator. As we do this, we can grab hold of the fresh Manna-Rhema-Instructing that will bless us and keep us in *Shalom as we war for what's ours in the Land the Lord Has given us to occupy, build, and make fruitful until His Coming.
Tradition holds that this is a time when the farmers may feel tempted to worry about whether their wheat harvests will yield well enough to last them the whole year. We know from Psalm 67 (which can be read daily during this time of omer-prayer) that as we praise, the Lord of the Harvest, Maker of Israel, Creator of the Heavens and the Earth will cause the land to yield her increase. As we study the Strength and Gifts the Lord has woven into the fabric of our bodies, spirits, and souls we feel our best and radiate His Glory-Light. As we build our Faith by counting the sheaves of omer, or the bits of harvestable produce we are seeing in our own lives at home or in the marketplace, we are prompted to stay thankful for all our inherent riches, find ways to elevate those internal qualities, and joyfully bring to mind all the Lord has done for us already... while Almighty God causes the corresponding material riches to grow and be made manifest.
The desire to praise and worship is a natural response to the understanding of our identity, that we are a royal priesthood created in the image and likeness- the face... the beauty... the majesty... and the personality- of the Most High God Who Made the Heavens and the Earth. As we sit with this Truth, as farmers and gardeners of our own soul-soil, we can feel the resonance of these "higher" thoughts; and we can move forward knowing that the seeds planted in us, in our harvest fields, will benefit from the nourishing frequencies emitted by the Living Waters of our time spent in the Word of God, along with the fertilizing Bread of Life and Cup of our Cleansing and our New Wine that come from our time spent communing with Yeshua-Jesus the Messiah-Christ. When our crops are raised this way, we can rejoice in advance knowing that our fruit will burst forth in abundance, fatness, and sweetness.
The first year I heard about counting the omer I had almost missed the entire season. I did my best to read as much as I could, but I knew I had to spend some time in observance of the practice in order to write about it. This year I had that chance. At the time of publishing this article, we have just moved through Pentecost-Shavuot: the memorial of the giving of the ten commandments and the landing of Holy Spirit upon the followers of Yeshua in the upper room. Each morning I made time to read and ponder the rabbis' prompts for evaluating and upgrading the way we show His Excellence of character in our lives as we serve and preserve ourselves and others. And it seemed that each day included a Divinely-Designed lesson to highlight the Truth about where I was in the development of those traits. During this time, I was deeply humbled by what I found in the shortcomings along with strengths of my soul-soil. While rabbinical tradition is outside of the cannon, I treasured the time to think about how my beliefs are being translated into actions and the messages I am transmitting by my behavior, or modus operandi.
On day 49 we are invited to consider that after doing our best to purify and elevate our personal and professional ministries of Love and Life, we must step aside and allow the Glory, Power, and Presence of the Almighty Most High Heavenly Father God to do the rest, to get us to the right places at the right times to let Him have His Way in the Earth as It Is in Heaven... through us. On that last day, I felt completely emptied of the familiar and filled with the fresh; yet I knew that was as far as I could go "on my own". On the 50th day, that ushered in the Feast of Shavuot, I entered into the most fervent time of worship and praise and prayer to date. As a result, I have been given new sense of God's Love, Joy, Strength, Peace, Oneness, Steadfastness, and Wholeness. And for the first time in my Life, I feel equipped spiritually and practically to win the battles to come... as Adonai Tseva-ot (Sabbaoth), the Lord of Holy Heavenly Hosts of Angel Armies, and I... war for the Land King Yeshua Has been promised by the Father, Adonai Nissi, to let me claim and name for Him and His Kingdom under the Banner of His Love.
If you missed the omer season this year, you might like skimming a few of the weeks' musings to begin to prepare your heart and mind to take the journey next year. I highly recommend it. If you celebrate with another tool, please let us know about it in the comments! Click here to link to the counting calendar that helped structure my meditation time.
Lord we pray this year that we are the plowmen overtaking the reapers, that our fields yield quickly and exponentially more than we could hope or imagine, and that we see Your increase in our lives according to the nature and nurture of the soul soil You've given us so that we can place Your Banner of Love above our territory in the Land of the Living for Your Good Name to be glorified throughout the Earth. A.M.E.N. El Melekh Ne'eman- for He Is [You Are, Lord] a Faithful King.
*Shalom: Completeness, the Atmosphere of Heaven, and the Abundance of All Good Things
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